Ymir wasn't at school the next day. Her siblings were; they sat at their table in their own little world, barely acknowledging the rest of the rest of the cafeteria.
Historia didn't want to think that Ymir trying to change out of Biology yesterday and her absence today were connected. That made her sound paranoid. Ymir wasn't skipping school because of her, she was skipping school for some other reason. Or she was sick.
Yeah. She was sick.
"Historia. Historia?"
She turned back to the conversation at the table. "Sorry?"
"We were talking about going down to the beach next week," Marco said. "Are you coming?"
"Um - maybe. I don't know, we might be busy."
"You should totally come," Sasha said, her mouth full of food. "There's gonna be a bonfire."
"Well, I'm not coming," Jean said. "Have fun freezing your asses off. I'll be at home, where it isn't raining."
"Who shat in your cereal?" Connie asked. "Anyway, even if the beach is shitty it's the only one we have, so we make do."
"I'll ask my uncle if I can come," Historia said. She'd never been to a beach on a rainy day before, and she wanted to spend time with her new friends. "It sounds fun."
Ymir didn't come to school for the rest of the week. Historia nearly asked her siblings the reason, but couldn't work up the courage to. They didn't give off a welcoming vibe.
The weekend soon came around, and Historia seemed to have been integrated into her new friend group. She'd been accepted into two groupchats (one with Jean and one without), had secured a full-time place at the table, and was currently being involved in the plan to go down to the beach. It was nice. She'd never been a part of a friend group before.
Uri didn't end up going to the Ackermans' house on Saturday. Mikasa had come down with a debilitating mystery illness, and in the off chance that it was contagious they weren't allowing any visitors to come around. Not wanting to cancel their game of cards, Kenny had come around with a six-pack of beers.
"She's been outta commission since Thursday," Kenny said. "Sick as a dog." He let out a laugh.
"Is she going to be okay?" Historia asked. She'd sat at the table with them, working on her homework.
"Ah, she'll be alright in a couple days. She's a strong kid. She used to be able to carry six chairs at once."
""Used to"? What happened?"
"She can carry ten now. Give a couple of months and she'll probably be able to carry double that."
Historia had seen Mikasa's muscles the day she'd dropped off the car, and could fully believe that she could lift that many chairs.
By Sunday, she'd finished the book she'd brought with her, and decided to take a trip down to the Paradis library. She was mildly disappointed at the meager stocking, however. She wasn't much interested in fishing or gardening. She figured she'd have to find a bookstore the next time she went into town, or check to see what the school library held.
On Monday, Ymir was back. Historia did her best to ignore her, trying to focus instead on her new friends and the snow that was coming down. She'd never seen snow before.
"It's wetter than I thought it would be," she told Sasha. "Like rain."
Sasha laughed. "Yeah, but you can't do this with rain."
And she picked up a handful of snow, rolled it into a ball, and threw it at the back of Jean's head. The iced coffee he'd been holding fell to the ground, the lid snapping off and causing it to spill all over the place.
"Shit!" He yelled. He spun around to glare at Sasha, who was doubled over laughing. Historia grabbed Sasha's wrist, and pulled her away as he chased them. Running while holding hands was hard, however, and Sasha slipped on some ice and fell over. Jean threw snow at her, but it didn't stop her laughter.
Historia had a feeling that she was being watched, and turned around. There Ymir was, staring directly at her. Historia pretended not to notice.
--
"She's still staring at you," Connie said. They were sitting in the cafeteria, animosity from the snowball incident as good as gone.
"Is she?" Historia didn't turn around. "Does she look angry?"
She didn't want to turn around.
"No, just... staring. What happened? Did you piss her off or something?"
"I don't think so," Historia said. "She just doesn't like me, for some reason."
That afternoon, Historia had Biology again, dread building in her stomach. As guessed, Ymir was in her seat, and staring at Historia as she walked in. Historia drew in a deep breath, and sat down next to her. As she had the week before, Ymir sat tensely next to her. Historia did her best to ignore her and focus on the lesson the teacher was explaining. The phases of mitosis. They were supposed to look at three unlabelled slides, and identify them. Worst of all, it was a partner project. Historia looked sidelong at Ymir, and gently cleared her throat to try and get her attention. When that didn't work, Historia went up to the front of the class where the microscopes were, grabbed one, and went back to the table, where she slammed it on the desk. It made a loud thud that caught the attention of almost everyone in the class.
"Sorry," Historia fake-apologised. The class went back to their own experiments. All except for Ymir. "Listen," Historia hissed. "If we're going to pass this class, then we need to work together. And we can't do that if you're ignoring me." She was proud of how well that came out.
Ymir grimaced at her. "Okay, princess," she said. "I'll help."
They took turns with the microscope, identifying the different phases. Ymir was surprisingly good at it.
"Have you done this before?" Historia asked, putting on her nice voice. Ymir gave her a curt nod.
"Yeah. I was held back. This one's in telaphase."
Historia looked through the microscope and, sure enough, Ymir was correct.
"I'm sorry about earlier," Historia continued.
"Why are you being so-" Ymir made a disgusted face, "-nice?"
"I don't know, why are you being so rude?" Historia snapped back. Ymir smirked.
"You're just pretending to be nice to try and get me to like you, right? Because that's not going to work."
"Fine, okay? You're getting on my nerves and I want you to stop," Historia said.
"That's better. Stop trying to be something you're not."
Historia understood what Uri had meant when he'd told her to stay away from Ymir. She really did feel like she was trying to lure Historia into delinquency.
"So I never got to really ask you for your name," Historia said.
"Ymir," she replied, "but you probably knew that. I'm something of a celebrity around here." She flashed a grin and exposed a set of too-perfect white teeth, like a supermodel might have.
"Yeah, I have heard. I'm Historia, by the way. I just moved here from-"
"From Maria. My brother told me. He knows everything."
Historia nearly asked her which one, but that would give away the fact that she'd already gossiped about the Fritz family.
"So, I'm guessing you have a good story," Ymir said as she started packing up the microscope.
"Hm?"
"The fake-sweet personality? The sudden move from sunny Maria to rainytown assfuck nowhere? What are you hiding?"
"Oh, I'm not hiding anything," Historia quickly said. "I just moved to live with my uncle, that's all."
"Parents kicked you out?"
"No, my dad got a new job, so he has to move around a lot. All his other kids are either out of school or don't care, but I wanted to finish school in one place, and I wasn't moving back in with my mom, so I came down here." She shuffled in her seat. "I actually haven't told anyone about my parents before."
"The youngest child of separated parents? That makes the sweet act thing understandable, then." Ymir stood up, and carried the microscope back to its trolley.
They went their separate ways after class, Historia feeling a strange sensation in her chest. It was a part nice feeling, and a part not-so-nice feeling. It was nice because Historia had finally gotten Ymir to talk to her. And it was not-so-nice because there was something off about Ymir.
Historia didn't know what it was, but she wanted to find out.